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Category: Whither Michigan?

Michigan: Time for public education to reinvent itself

More good news. Gov. Jennifer Granholm again cut state spending for education. The public education system, when flush, left hundreds of thousands of students behind. So in an economic crunch, there's no need to fund it at previous levels, given the system's sorry performance record.

This would be a good time for the state's too-many school districts to reorganize its thinking and budgets. There's no credible evidence that higher spending increases student performance.

Trim the administrative staff. Do you really need assistant superintendents in hard times? How about also axing assistant principals and have one principal for, say, every five schools? Give teachers more responsibility. Michigan teachers are some of the highest paid in the country. If they need close watching by principals, perhaps it's time to rethink their training and qualifications, too.

Perhaps it is time to disband school transportation systems. That'll save money and walking to school will do kids good, if reports of Michigan's fat progeny are any indication.

In hammering education, however, the governor is a tad disingenuous. She's calling for new taxes to cover cuts in the education budget. There's plenty of revenues to cover those cuts.

All the governor and legislature have to do is trim other programs.

It's called balancing the budget, a matter of priorities.

At the moment, education is at the bottom of the priority list.

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